lionkingcmsl: (Trained lion)
LionkingCMSL ([personal profile] lionkingcmsl) wrote2013-11-01 09:15 am

Veggies vs snack foods; thoughts

There are some "snack foods" that I have trouble with how the media and the medical profession portray them.

They are potato chips, french fries and pop corn.

Let's take the the first two and compare that with the veggie, the potato.

First if the potato is baked, or mashed, and lather with salt, butter and/or sour cream it is considered healthy eating. Good for you; no problem. Scalloped potatoes are a grey area, but that dish is not just potatoes.

But if you take that exact same potato and slice it thinly, or "french" it, and deep fry it in pure vegatable oil and put some salt on it, it is not considered healthy eating. It has stopped being a vegatable! :=O

WHY?!? It is the exact same thing! If anything potato chips and fench fries, if cooked in pure vegatable oil, are more healthy, as they are lower in cholesterol; a very good thing.

The same holds true for pop corn. A roasted ear of corn, or, worse yet, boiled to an inch of its life, slathered in butter and salted is considered a vegatable and healthy eats.

But if you dare to eat popped corn with a little butter and salt you are commiting a grave sin for eating unhealthy! 8=O

It is the same blasted thing, just cooked differently, especially if it is air popped corn.

It is somewhat ironic for McDonald's to say they are replacing french fries with vegatables. In my mind french fries are vegatables.

The same can be said for pretzles vs. bread. Pretzles are just bread cooked differently, though there is a bit more salt on them.

[identity profile] kamiten.livejournal.com 2013-11-01 06:54 pm (UTC)(link)
These comparisons are amusing to me, because according to my diet, all forms of all those things are bad because they break down into sugar. ;)

[identity profile] mooncat.livejournal.com 2013-11-01 10:38 pm (UTC)(link)
I think it also depends on the circumstances of each thing. Yes, potato chips and french fries, while they are a vegetable, are -deep-fried-. That is not healthy. (granted neither is drowning a baked potato with butter, sour cream and such.)

Air-popped popcorn is fine, but most bagged popcorn snacks are not air popped and are coated in oils and chemically created 'flavours' and usually a metric shit-ton of salt.